"A bloodline?"
"Yes, a Bloodline. It is the lineage of a Vampire, consisting of anyone they have ever turned, that is what we are up against."
Eldrain revealed as he moved towards the door, gesturing Shin and me to follow.
"All right then, let's hunt some vampires."
The excitement was clearly visible within Shin as he followed Eldrain.
I turned back to An and bowed slightly.
"Thank you for teaching me about Magic and Alchemy."
Despite not being able to look at her face, I could tell she was smiling like a mother looking at her children.
"Take this with you."
Looking back up, I saw her holding a vial with a blue liquid that was almost the same as the one in the syringe I had found before.
Yet entirely different in vibe.
"Use it when you find yourself backed in a corner."
She tied the vial in a soft cloth to ensure it would not get broken and then handed it to me.
"Thank you. I hope there does not come a point I need it, but if I do, thank you."
After that, I turned to the Princess and bowed.
"Your Highness. I apologise for not greeting you earlier."
"Inspector Jacob, I wish you good fortune on this endeavour and about the earlier instance, pay it no mind; you were clearly focused on your task. I respect the effort you put in keeping this city safe."
Hearing her give me such praise gave me the motivation to try even harder.
I then left the lab with Eldrain and Shin, walking down the stairs, I asked a question that had plagued my mind for a while.
"How will we track the vampires? If even locator spells can't work on them."
"We will do it like a predator tracking their prey. Pick up their scent, follow it, and then be quick about it."
He sure does know a lot about Vampires. I guess that is to be expected for an adventurer who is married to an Elf.
"How do you know so much about Vampires?"
"I may or may not have dabbled in the matter before. Now, before we run into one, time for the ABCs of Vampires. First, they do not feed on blood for nutrition; they do it to absorb the Mana from other creatures to sustain their body. Two, they are suspended beings; every cell of their body is dead, no heartbeat, no blood flowing, yet it moves due to the Mana flowing in their body. If you hurt them, they get injured, but their body returns to the state of rest by rebuilding it back together. Which is why it is so hard to kill them. Three, they are generally numb, meaning they can't sense touch or taste, but they can sense energy, which allows them to see and hear."
That somehow makes sense and still leaves so many questions unanswered.
When we were outside, we were greeted by the loud and heavy rain.
"Which way to Markus's house?"
Eldrain asked, and so I pointed west.
"About Thirteen Km West from here. Building number Twenty Three Thirty Four."
The man wasted no second and grabbed Shin and me by the back of our clothes.
I must have just blinked, and we were inside Markus's house.
My sense of reality had just died. What is even going on? Is this real?
"Wondering what just happened?"
"Yeah, that was weird. Did we teleport?"
Chuckle
Shin chuckled as if I had made a terrible joke and shook his head.
"The Old fossil here can move at light speed; he carried us here with him."
What!
The speed of light, is this man even human?
Approaching the base of the stairs, Eldrain looked at one of the soldiers stationed there.
"When did Raghav leave?"
"Just a minute ago."
Tch
With a click of the tongue, Eldrain moved on, placing his hand on the walls as Shin and I got back to our conversation behind him.
"By the way, we kind of forgot to ask An about the changes within you."
Shin reminded me as I grunted, no matter. I will ask her later.
"I'm more interested in what just happened. I have never heard of a human warrior going at the speed of light before."
"Well, that makes sense, he is not human, he's half elf, half dwarf."
Okay, I call BS on that. This is a Six foot four something dude, who is almost as buff as Raghav. No pointy ears and clean shaven. I don't even know if both the genes even tried to come on top.
"What changes are you going through, Jacob?"
Eldrain asked as we reached the top floor.
"I did not get enhanced when I arrived in this world, nor did I gain any powers. But today I feel as if I am getting stronger and faster."
Halting his steps just before the door to Markus's study and turned around, grabbed my face, looking in my eyes.
"Where did you keep the syringe when you fell?"
Oh no, did I inject myself with the syringe? I moved my coat to the side and lifted my shirt, and in a moment, Eldrain found the mark.
"Yeah, you got injected with the potion. But the dosage appears to be small enough to not alter your DNA. But just enough to boost your physical performance. Given my experience with matters such as this, you should be fine, and the effects must wear off sometime soon."
He pulled my shirt back down and patted my chest with his right hand before turning around and moving to the study.
"Kind of like a steroid, nice."
Shin commented as he patted my shoulders.
"Mr Exter! What can I assist you with?"
Chief Palo asked, to which Eldrain nodded.
"Could you give me the room for a moment? I'm chasing a lead."
"At once, men give the gentlemen the room."
With that, Chief Palo made his exit and began to look around for more evidence or clues that could help our investigation.
I sensed a heavy thickness in the air as it became hard to breathe.
Until Shin placed his hand on my shoulder, and the pressure lessened.
I saw that I was engulfed in a jet black glow, the same as Shin's
"What is happening?"
"Eldrain's pumping his Mana in the room, flooding it. I am protecting us from it."
It took us a few moments before Eldrain and Shin withdrew their powers, and Eldrain moved towards Markus's corpse.
Bending down to stare at it.
"Such is life, guess that is one less variable for tomorrow."
Then Eldrain stood up and walked towards the window.
"Okay, we have a lead, but we'd better be quick about this if we want to catch her. Jacob, get on my back."
I complied, climbing on the man's back as he looked back at Shin.
"Try and keep up, kid."
The next thing I knew, we were soaring through the air, jumping across the rooftops. At speeds that made me feel like I was in a bullet train, just on the outside.
"What are we doing?"
"Tracking their trail, whenever a vampire feeds on a person, they leak that foreign Mana for some time before it blends in with the rest. I filled the study with my Mana to read the years of Mana imprints that Markus had left in that place. Allowing me to be familiar with his Mana so as not to lose its trace."
A few moments later, we found ourselves at the roundabout clock tower park at the northern end of the City.
One of the most bustling parts not to forget, for a vampire, it's like a buffet.
The three of us safely landed in the park, and I hopped off Eldrain's back as he looked around and sighed.
"This is where the trail ends."
"A wide open, dead end."
Shin commented as he looked around at the number of people there were around us.
My focus was entirely on the ground where the rainwater was flowing towards the Tower, and it seemed to be the case with the entire Park.
"Maybe not, I have an idea. You guys will have to back me up."
The two of them looked at one another and nodded.
"We got your back."
Alright then, time to tempt death.
I walked towards the clock tower and entered it, and the sound of cogs turning filled my ears as I could literally hear the clock tick away.
Above me was the internal mechanism of the clock tower.
But the focus of my attention was on the floor.
For years, I always felt as if this clock tower was odd and ominous.
Today I will find out if I was right or wrong.
Placing my hand on the floor under the stairs, I started tapping it in random places until my hand sank in along with the floor.
The floor seemed to move and spin out of place.
Walking off, I climbed the stairs as the entire floor rotated out to the side, revealing a secondary set of stairs, continuing from where the base stairs left off.
"Well, in for a penny."
I began my descent down the stairs, going on for about as deep as the tower was tall. Before finding myself at a steel door that was directly under the main door.
Which I had to slowly open as it groaned under its own weight.
It led me to a corridor that had had multiple corridors splitting off from it, in front of each other.
As soon as I stepped through the lights inside began to flicker on, yet despite their hardest effort, they failed.
Remaining as flickers that just added to the horror I was feeling.
When I reached the first turn, I looked left and right, finding a curved corridor on both sides, possibly looping around the entire place.
Creak
Without a second thought, I pulled out my crossbow and spun around, getting on one knee, aiming the crossbow at the door.
For what felt like five minutes, I waited for something to happen, but nothing did.
So, steeling my resolve, I walked forward and opened the door. Finding myself in a room with around seven coffins lying on marble tables
Most of which were open with their lids to the side, all except for one.
I approached the unopened coffin.
"In for a pound."
Placing my hands on the side of the lid and pulling it open, but in doing so, I managed to cut my finger tip.
My heartbeat began to race as I watched a drop of blood fall onto the body within.
Specifically, its mouth.
His eyes shot open, and his body lunged forward to try to bite my neck.
But he was stopped by a hand that grabbed his face and pushed him down.
"Given your state, I would say you have about two minutes of consciousness. Tell me what this place is, what is happening here, and where I can find your sire. If you comply, I won't kill you right now."
Eldrain asked calmly, holding a wooden stake made of Peepal wood in his right hand above the man's chest.
While the other hand held the vampire in place.
"Haha, the Eternal Vampire Hunter is telling me he won't kill me. What a joke. I won't tell you anything."
His raspy voice broke the silence before he grunted in pain as Eldrain moved the stake lower.
"I will tell you. This is... was our Safe Haven. We built this place a century ago to hide from you. Our leader, Kruti, told us we will remain here until you pass away. Yesterday, she came down here with a man called Vasqe. She fed all of us some blood to tell us that he is under attack and that she will be back with more and will get us out of here to help her. Looking around, I guess I am the last one left. Now that is all I know. Do what you must."
I studied the expression on Eldrain's face as it did not shift in the slightest.
Then my eyes moved to his hand, which, instead of going down, came back up as he placed the stake back in his pouch.
"Someone will come get you in a while. After that, what happens to you is in the hands of the Duke."
The man tried to speak, but his body froze as Eldrain closed the man's eyes.
"What happened to him?"
I asked as Eldrain clenched his jaw.
"He is in a coma, his body has run out of Mana and is just sitting there waiting to be reawakened. For a hundred years, they hit down here in hopes of living forever. That is what it means To Be a Vampire. A being so afraid of the future end that they would discard their humanity and even waste away the present."
Loud footsteps entered the room as I saw Shin standing there.
"There are Forty Five coffins in total in this entire facility."
Eldrain closed his eyes and exhaled a deep breath before opening them again.
"You two move back to your original investigation. These Vampires are mine to deal with."
He then marched towards the door as Shin stepped aside, and I rushed after him.
"Are you sure you can handle Forty Six of them all by yourself?"
Maybe I shouldn't have said that to a half elf half dwarf hybrid.
Hearing my words, Eldrain stopped in his tracks and looked back at me.
"Fear not, Kid, as you heard, I am the Eternal Vampire Hunter. I have almost eradicated their entire species; these Forty Six are the last of the bunch. Today I will fulfil my vow and end them once and for all. You go ahead and do your work."
After delivering a monologue straight out of a fantasy novel, he vanished with the flickering lights to fight his battle, having left us to fight ours.